R29 per GB ADSL promotion only the start

Afrihost stunned the local ADSL ISP market in September when it launched its R29/GB ADSL data bundle promotion.  At the time the lowest per-GB ADSL prices were hovering at around R50 per GB, and Afrihost’s below-cost offering was met with jubilation by ADSL consumers.

While Afrihost CEO Gian Visser won’t divulge their exact subscriber numbers, he did say that thousands of clients have taken advantage of the R29/GB special.  Afrihost has therefore become one of the prominent ADSL ISPs within a very short period of time.

Afrihost has been criticized by some competitors for selling services below cost, which critics say is not sustainable in the long run, but Visser is confident that lower wholesale pricing in future will make their ADSL division profitable. “While our service is not profitable at the moment we are confident that as the overall wholesale cost of bandwidth comes down in South Africa over the next few years our ADSL division will become profitable in the future,” said Visser.

Visser further confirmed that Afrihost took a knock on pricing with their R14.50 per GB ADSL top-up promotion.   “The R14.50/GB ‘Buy One Topup, Get One Free’ was a promotion we ran to reward clients who had taken the leap with us. We obviously took a knock on this pricing but our hope was that it would generate both goodwill among our clients and create further publicity for our ADSL offerings,” said Visser.

Unbeknownst to many Afrihost subscribers international bandwidth for the ADSL service is mainly carried via SEACOM.  International bandwidth via SEACOM has taken some time to filter down to consumers, but over the last few weeks aggressively priced SEACOM based ADSL services are starting to emerge in the market.

The R29/GB ADSL data bundle promotion and R14.50 top up offer is however only the beginning for Afrihost, says Visser.  “We are always planning offerings and features that we hope will surprise and delight our clients. Our main priority at the moment is to continue improving our current ADSL offering to ensure both superb value and exceptional service for all our clients. Our goal is to create an ADSL service that is unquestionably the best in the industry.”

Visser added that they will definitely offer more connectivity solutions in the future.  “At the moment we are getting feedback from our clients and watching the industry as to what exactly those services will be. We would love to offer a groundbreaking uncapped solution – however, the challenge there is to provide a service that is stable, fast and affordable – and we want to ensure that we can do this brilliantly before we launch an offering that may disappoint our clients and tarnish the brand we are building,” Visser concluded.

Afrihost ADSL offerings – discussion